To understand why a 73-year-old actor who's lecturing in Berkeley tomorrow night has been designated a "Living National Treasure" in Japan, it helps to know the sex change that happened to Kabuki right after it was born.

The acting is as immediate as it is timeless in its precision, presence and grace. The tragedy takes root in small gestures and eloquent tableaux to expand with inexorable force. The same actors who bring impressive gravity to the tragedy can execute wondrously rollicking slapstick comedy with both hands tied behind their backs. In fact, the comedy is all the funnier because one actor has both hands tied behind his back and the other's arms are bound spread-eagle to a long pole.

The extraordinary art of Grand Kabuki was on display Friday and Saturday at Zellerbach Hall, courtesy of Cal Performances. It was a more exceptional treat than the rarity of Grand Kabuki visits might indicate.

Kabuki Dance British Museum, Londonby CLEMENT CRISP for the Financial Times

Ganjiro's art is that of the onnagata player, devoted to female roles, and he is a uniquely magnificent actor. For his British Museum display, Ganjiro gave a celebratory dance, Shimo No Senzai, telling of the art of a medieval travelling courtesan who appears disguised as a nobleman (with movement in severe, ritualistic style) before throwing off her masculine robes to reveal her actual identity in faster and more yielding dance.

In impressive contrast, Ebizo also stars in the programme's first work, Fuji Musume, the Wisteria Maiden - but he undergoes an exquisite transformation into a young woman. This is a near abstract solo dance, in which Ebizo displays the full fluttering coquetry of a girl in love, his wrists delicately lifted, his glance sliding shyly, his fabulous kimono proudly displayed.

Unlike most virile single actors, Ichikawa Ebizo XI tries to discourage the giggling flocks of female admirers who hang around after performances — although, if he fails, he should at least be able to outrun them. “My grandfather was handsome,” he says, “and had a lot of fans. Now they are old ladies, but they love me because I look like him.”

As the drama progresses into an increasingly involved tale of adultery, murder, body-concealment, facial disfigurement and eroticised horror, a radio-linked voice quietly translates and decrypts, dripping the plot like poison into your ear. An experience that would otherwise have been beautiful but bemusing is thus translated into flamboyant and compelling drama (I can't help thinking that the same thing might prove helpful for those new to classical ballet, with its ritualised stories and elaborate mime sequences).

Kabuki, Sadler’s Wells, Londonby CLEMENT CRISP for the Financial Times

Ebizo is undeniably skilled, alert in manner, but I missed a quality of inevitability that suggests there is no other way the feelings and movements could be better expressed, which I have seen in performances by a supreme onnagata artist, Nakamura Ganjiro III. (His solo during the British Museum’s Kabuki exhibition last autumn, in which he played a travelling courtesan impersonating a man – a treble bluff, a role within a role within a role – was one of the greatest dance performances I have ever seen.)

Though greeted with the cheers and standing ovation that are de rigueur for exotic foreign visitors to these shores, the whole evening struck me as odd rather than entertaining, and to be frank, something of an anti-climax.

From Marcia Siegel in the Boston Phoenix (following a review of Fist and Heel):

Quote:

Neo-hoodoo and street kabukiFist and Heel at Concord’s Summer Stages and Kabuki in New York

I wouldn’t say Nakamura Kanzaburo XVIII’s Heisei Nakamura-za undersells kabuki tradition, but it’s a tricky balance the players try to effect. Kanzaburo ... continues a family line of kabuki actors that traces back four centuries. In the plays brought to New York, he dominated his troupe of actors and musicians, playing just about every type in the kabuki stylebook: warrior hero, refined female, ruffian, demon, low comedian.

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests

You cannot post new topics in this forumYou cannot reply to topics in this forumYou cannot edit your posts in this forumYou cannot delete your posts in this forumYou cannot post attachments in this forum